Alternate Avenues of Investigation
by Morange
Summary: When a good friend of the Winchester brothers goes missing there is only one place they can go for help. His old team, the BAU.
1. Walking Into The Fire

Title: Alternate Avenues of Investigation 1/?

Fandom: (Criminal Minds/ Supernatural)

Rating: PG-13

Spoilers: Pre-Foyet for Criminal Minds, after the boys have met Hendrickson and racked up a death toll.

Summary: When a good friend of the brothers goes missing there is only one place they can go for help. His old team, the BAU.

Disclaimer: As usual I own nothing, though I pay through the nose for internet access

Note: There are three different versions of this fic floating around in my head, all of them just slightly different. *argh*

Dean stared through his shades at the building in front of him. Sam sat in the passenger seat beside.

"Are you sure of this?" he asked. "Usually I'm the one that wants to ask for help but this is serious Dean."

Dean's mouth twitched – not quite a smile. "Don't go getting worried about me you big girl. Besides, Jason needs help that we can't give him. They can."

The Impala fell silent again for a few moments before dean broke it. "Ok, let's put this plan into action."

He got out of the car and Sam slid over to the drivers' seat. Not able to resist one last comment he leaned on the window. "And be careful of my baby Sammy, I'll take it out on you otherwise."

Not giving Sam any time to respond he pushed off and walked through the revolving doors of the building they had been investigating for the last day and sitting in front of for the past hour. Calmly striding into the main foyer he laughed inside at the reactions of those in the building but carried on to the desks where a young woman sat open mouthed. He was just about to 'introduce himself' when two of the security guards surrounded him.

"On your knees now! Hands behind your head!"

Dean smirked. "My name is Dean Winchester and I will only speak to Aaron Hotchner and his team."

One of the guards can closer to him while others began to pour in from other rooms. Dean just repeated his statement over again while hoping Sam's part of the plan was going to order.


	2. The Team's Puzzlement

**PT2**

The BAU bullpen was in its normal state of activity when JJ walked through on her way to Hotch's office. Tapping on the door she stepped inside at Hotch's ok.

"Can I help you JJ?" he asked in a calm tone.

"ten minutes ago Dean Winchester walked through the front door and asked to speak to you."

JJ's puzzlement was obvious. Dean and his brother Sam Winchester had been leading the FBI on a rabbit hunt for the past year, making many agents nervous. The fact that he'd walked into a FBI building was nothing short of bizarre, though Hotch didn't know enough to understand the man's intentions.

"Me personally?" he clarified.

She flicked through the file in her hand. "You and the team. He identified himself and hasn't said anything else and the only things they found during the search that he had on him were these."

JJ handed over four photos, printed off on normal computer paper. Hotch couldn't identify three of them but the last photo was a man he knew very well.

"Get the team in the conference room with Winchesters file, have Morgan sit on Winchester, I want to know if he even twitches." He stormed out of the office towards the conference room, Jason Gideon's photo clutched tightly in his hand.

Reid watched Hotch stride out of his office followed by JJ. The worried look on her face caught Reid's eye, for someone who generally didn't understand people even he could see the worried tension radiating off he.

"JJ?" he asked softly. "Is there something wrong with Hotch?"

She flustered. "Not Hotch. He wants you in the conference room. A new profile on Dean Winchester."

Morgan's voice joined their conversation. "Winchester? As in the guy who is on a spree across America with his brother that none of the agency can stop?"

The Winchesters actions were by this stage something of an in-house embarrassment. Every time the FBI got close to the Winchester brothers they either disappeared from custody or ended up dead. Only to later appear at the scene of another crime. The agent in charge of the case from all that Morgan knew was determined to catch them or die trying.

"As in Dean Winchester who walked into the building ten minutes ago and gave himself up asking to talk to Hotch or one of you." JJ replied.

Reid was puzzled, each of the times that the brothers had been in custody there had been a reason, but he couldn't see one here. "Do we know why?" he asked.

"No," she worried at her lip. "But it has something to do with Gideon."

Reid froze. Gideon. The man who had bought him into the BAU, who had taught him so much. The man who left him with only a letter for consolation. He shook himself out of his state; there would be time later for all the questions running through his head. Right now he would have to deal. JJ was still talking.

"Morgan, Winchester should have been escorted into the interrogation room by now. Hotch wants you to sit on him. See how he acts. He walked in here of his own free will and Hotch wants to know why, but not until he has a full profile."

Morgan nodded, up and out of the room as soon as she had finished.

The team sat around the table reading over the files which made up Dean Winchesters profile. The more they read, the more they were puzzled.

"This doesn't make sense. The murders in St Louis were terrifying and brutal. Yet the next crime that they commit is grave desecration? They were accelerating up til that point and then what, a sudden stop? It doesn't make sense."

Reid's frustration with the files was growing. As the fastest reader he had blurred through them while the others were still on their firsts. The worry over Gideon and how he could be connected for spurring him on faster. Never mind emotionally compromised, that was the teams default setting.

Rossi was concerned over the time line. "Hendrickson seems to want to pin everything he can on them. He has them in Ohio with fake credit cards and two states over kidnapping hikers." He turned to Hotch. "I agree with Reid. There's something we're missing here"

"Have we figured out who the other three photos are?" Prentiss asked.

Hotch shook his head. "I have Garcia running them through the databases but nothing yet. She'll call when she has something."

He stood, leaving the others to further look through the files . "I'm going to see what I can get out of Winchester. Maybe something he says will be the missing piece."

He murmured the last under his breath. Jason Gideon had been a good friend of his for a long time. And while he wasn't as upset about it as Reid (and he didn't think anyone could be) it still hurt that the man had left the team so suddenly. knowing this information about Winchester didn't make the situation any less bizarre, it made it more complicated. And he still didn't understand the man's intentions.


	3. Puzzle Pieces

"Hotch!" Garcia bustled down the hallway of the BAU to where the team had settled themselves in the conference room.

"You just missed him; he's gone to start on Winchester. Why?" Rossi asked with no little curiosity, the rest of the team's attention now on the colourful lady.

"I genius of unparalleled standard that I am," she paused. "Though a different kind of genius then you Reid." she qualified. "Have identified the three other photos. You may all bow and worship."

Prentiss snorted, "We'll leave that to Morgan. Who were they?"

Garcia pulled the photos up on the projector. "Photo number one is Cathy Flynn. Real Estate agent from North Virginia. Mom of 2 kids, husband reported her missing two weeks ago. No leads in her case." you could see the brunettes smiling face, taken candidly as if from far. "Photo two is Michael Blake. Freelance photographer." the young man looked to be in his early twenties and this photo was taken across a road, the cars clear in-between the camera and the object of its focus. "He was meant to turn in an assignment to his boss but didn't. Boss called the police after Blake didn't answer his phone for a day." The third photo was next. "And now we have Jessica Adams, student at Georgetown studying 17th century English Literature. Was out at a club with friends, disappeared after going to the restrooms last week." the young woman was all glamed up. Obviously the night that she went missing.

Garcia fell silent as Gideon's picture popped up. No one commented at how intensely Reid stared at it. Gideon looked relaxed; the differences between when he was working with them visible in the relaxed eyes and posture, things profilers are trained to read instantly.

"Are we thinking that Winchester kidnapped them?" JJ wondered aloud. "He and his brother, while they've done worse, don't seem the type to walk in and give themselves away."

"Unless this is all just a ploy?" Prentiss countered.

Reid nodded. "They've done it before. Hendrickson believes the only reason they were caught in Wisconsin was so they could get into Green River County."

"They were all successful." Rossi thought aloud. "Adams was a straight a student, Flynn made thousands of dollars on commissions and managed to keep a family. Even Blake was a well paid freelancer, doing work for anything up to National Geographic.

"All taken very quickly, noticed missing within a few hours, or in the case of Adams within half and hour." Prentiss added.

The rattle of Garcia's keys added more information. "All geographically spread out, ranging from Baltimore and heading this way. But we don't know where Gideon lives to know whether he was part of the pattern or if he stumbled onto it and was taken so we didn't hear about it."

Garcia had never tried to trace Gideon, he wanted his privacy and she was hurt when he left. Now she was regretting that she never tried to keep track of him. The uncertainty was killing her and not knowing how this was all connected was irritating her.

"We need what ever it is that Winchester knows; we're just working from supposition." Prentiss grumbled.

* * *

He doesn't look like much, Morgan thought as he stared through the glass into Winchester's interrogation room. Just another of the many weirdoes and freaks that their team dealt with every year. Winchester was still, except for a twitch in his hand s every so often, as if he needed something to hold. The man had been carefully searched when he entered the building and according to the searchers went along with every instruction given. Not the mark of a man with something to hide.

Morgan's specialty was obsessional crimes, what the Winchesters crimes fitted into but Morgan wasn't seeing the edge that they all seemed to have. There was something that he was missing in this situation

Hotch poked his head into the small room. "Turn the system on. We don't need any question of what happened later on."

Morgan nodded and Hotch left.

* * *

Hotch barely had the door open before he began to speak. "And what is it that you want from my team and I, Mr Winchester?" he didn't feel the need to beat around the bush for information.

"The thing about being on the run, when you truly do need the help from the authorities. You're kind of screwed." dean replied with a small grin.

Dean looked at the Fed sitting across the small interrogation table with uncharacteristic seriousness. He knew this man from Jason's stories, knew that he was one of the good guys (Jason tended to wax poetically when he was drunk). So after instigating a short staring contest he answered the question with his own.

"Do you mind if I tell a little story Agent Hotchner?"

Hotch gave him a glare. "I mind if you waste my time. "

Dean sobered. "I agree time is something we can't waste in this situation."

"And what situation is that?" Hotch asked hoping to get some answers. Dean's face was grim.

"You obviously looked at the pictures I had with me?" Hotch gave a short nod. "We'll start the story the traditional way. Once upon a time." Hotch gave Dean a dirty look. "There was a man who enjoyed his job. He was good at it, he could see things that others missed and understood the shit that people could sink to. One day, after a case that piled on to the worst and ended with a dear friend dead. He took off, looking to find something better. But he didn't. He found the things that hide in the dark are just as dangerous as people, sometimes more so."

"You're talking about Gideon."

Dean nodded. "Kidnapped the day before yesterday by the same person who took the others, or at least that's what we figured when Jason didn't meet up with us as planned."

"And you think because it's Gideon that my team and I will just overlook the fact and you and your brother are also serial killers and that this may all be a trap?"

Dean huffed. "You don't trust Gideon to be my character reference?"

"There's been no proof you even know Gideon yet, your brother may have him and this is an elaborate scheme to get information, like you did at Green River." Hotch remembered that little nugget from the file. Not many people get put into prison for what seems like no reason just to break out again.

"Jason bought the other three to our attention. When we were meant to meet him to discuss it he didn't show."

Whatever else Hotch was about to say was cut off by a knock on the glass behind his head. He stood up, leaving Dean alone in the small room.

"For god's sake, let me help goddamn it!" Dean shouted.


	4. Further Information

Warning, I wrote this part of Notepad so expect a few spelling mistakes. And sorry for how long it took to get out. :(

* * *

Morgan was waiting for him when he came out of the room.

"The others really need to know what you've been able to pull from him, they've identified the other photographs but we don't know whether they're other victims or even if there is a crime in the first place. This could all be Winchesters way of distracting us from something else. At this point they're only missing; nothing to really link them except the photos."

"According to Winchester they are victims. The UNSUB took them and Gideon told him and his brother about it. And since Gideon went missing he came to us."

"What do you think about his story?" Hotch asked, wanting his opinion.

Morgan mused. "It would explain why he'd walk into the FBI headquarters; even at Green River he tripped the alarm somewhere else. This time he's walk straight into the lions den. That's either courage or desperation."

"Have you noticed the use of Jason instead of Gideon?" Hotch asked. It was bothering him actually. That this man who was supposedly a serial killer used his friends' first name.

"Yeah, I mean, even Reid never calls him Jason. It either Winchester knows him really well or he's trying to..." Morgan drifted off.

Hotch and Morgan just stared at each other for a moment until Hotch decided, "I want to see him interact with the others. Maybe we'll also get some more information from him."

"We did the same thing with Hightower, although that did end with him blowing the head off of Mason Turner."

* * *

Hotch walked Dean in front of him. He'd gone back into the room and Dean had obviously seen the answer of his face. The expression of relief that flashed across Dean's face made Hotch put another tick in the column marked 'not the unsub'. Luckily they didn't pass anyone in the hall; he didn't want to explain how he had lost his mind. All he knew was that his team was running around like bees with no flowers in reach and Winchester held the key to it all.

To say his team was surprised at Winchesters appearance was to say the ocean was wet. All except Rossi, sometimes Hotch wished the man didn't know him quite so well.

The first thing Dean noticed of the room was the board that covered three quarters of a wall covered in either pictures of Jason and the others or information about the two of them. And he was a little awestruck at how thorough they were with only an hour or so having gone by since he'd arrived in the building.

"Whoa, you guys sure know how to get to know a guy, you could've just asked me out for coffee," he joked to break the tension in the room. He was a bit disturbed by the pride of place being given to a still shot of his interview with Diana, that detective from Baltimore.

Hotch waved at Dean. "Winchester, my team-"

Dean cut him off. "All good, I know who you guys are too, kinda makes it even." he paused, "though I only hear about you when Jason gets drunk except for genius boy over here." A thumb was jabbed in Reid's direction

"Me!" Reid piped up, annoyed at how much his voice squeaked. To say he was intimidated by the man standing in front of him would be an understatement.

"Yeah, he's all my former student Spencer' and 'Spencer would know the Mayan god of Thursdays'."

"There is no Mayan god of Thursdays" Reid replied puzzled.

"I know that. Just making a point man."

"Why don't we get to the point of why you are here Mr. Winchester, it's not just because you like the hospitality of the FBI building." Rossi intervened.

"Well," dean said glancing at the board, "you guys seem to have a pretty good idea of the basics of the case. But I can fill in some gaps for you."

He settled himself into one of the seats halfway round the table. They all noticed that he positioned himself facing the door and back to the wall. "Three days ago we get a call from Jason. Usual chit chat then he got a bit weird. Asked what kind of things could make someone disappear without a trace." He wasn't too worried about talking of 'things' the Baltimore image meant they already knew he believed in the supernatural so he didn't mind giving the headshrinkers that information the idea of a what not a who.

"Told him yeah, there are a number of things that can make someone disappear, though not completely, there's usually traces left behind. Some form of Signal or an EMF reading. Some sign. We were going to meet up day before yesterday to help him but he never showed."

He paused, from here on out the evidence he had was circumstance and they already though he was a crazy serial killer but Jason had become a friend to Sam and him, and considering he went to prison for a friend of his fathers, his own friends surely deserved the same efforts.

"Sammy and I went to his house and it was clean. And I mean super clean, like someone had gone through and removed any traces of it being anymore than a show home. Sam tried to call him, didn't answer and then we found those." he pointed to the four photos. "In his mailbox, meaning someone had put them in since we got there, and knew we were in the house."

The team understood his point instantly. To be watched by the UNSUB while looking in a victims house. Dean crumpled.

"He's a friend. He used to go on about you guys so we're kind of hoping you can help. Otherwise we're up shit creek and the paddle was lost awhile ago.

* * *

Like many of Dean's plans there was a certain element of luck involved. While they had entrance and exit strategies planned out much of the situation relied on Dean getting Jason's team to help them. But that wasn't to say that Sam couldn't do his part. So there he was sitting in an internet cafe three blocks from the Federal Building hoping that no one recognized him. It wouldn't do for him to get picked up by some off duty over-zealous fed before he was of any use to anyone.

While Jason had told them about Penelope Garcia's amazing computer skills and the skills that the rest of the team had, Sam had two advantages that they didn't. He had gained some seriously interesting contacts during the years that he and dean had been traveling, and that was on top of his fathers list of 'go to for help'. The type of people that wouldn't talk to a Suit if it was offering a get out of jail free card. And not all of them were involved in the supernatural; plenty of them were friends the three of them had made by being in the right place at the right time.

They also didn't have the dreams that gave him an idea of who exactly they were looking for.

Sam ran the program he had set up, scanning for anything out of the ordinary, anything that would spark off something to investigate. Dean had instructions if the team chose to help.

Hopefully they wouldn't have to go with plan C where he had to break Dean out of Federal custody.


End file.
